


The State of Grace | Band of Brothers

by roguesunday



Category: Band of Brothers
Genre: Alternate History, Band Of Brothers - Freeform, Combat medic, E Company - Freeform, Easy Company - Freeform, Gen, Military, Original Female Character(s) - Freeform, Original Male Character(s) - Freeform, Platonic friendships, Wanting To Belong, World War II, and healthy family dynamics, johnny and bull are the ultimate dads™, possibly some xanax too, searching for purpose, second family, someone get this girl a therapist
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-30
Updated: 2020-09-30
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:41:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26720833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/roguesunday/pseuds/roguesunday
Summary: Marley Chevalier, no matter how badly she wants to, has never been one to test the limits. With a passionate heart at odds with expectations she knows she can never meet, her life has forever been in a state of limbo. That is, until December 7th, 1941.The frangible and unsuspecting way that she's lived her life is gone, replaced with two brothers being called for return to service and her small town turning upside down with fear and wartime rage. The new tenuous reality that is her home of Houma, Louisiana leads Marley to a choice that will test every limit she'd once been too afraid to push; she enlists.Before the war, enlistment had meant steady jobs for her brothers and the Great War that had long since passed. Now, it means concealing her name in the desperate hope that she can help in any way she knows how. And as fate would have it, history changes its course when she is placed among the likes of everyday men who, too, are to rewrite what it means to be a soldier for the United States. And with the men of Easy Company, Marley realizes that to make it through the Hell that is war, she has to embrace the fact that her once careful way of life will never be hers to live again.
Relationships: Eventual OC/Canon Character
Kudos: 5





	1. Chapter 1

**THE STATE OF GRACE**

_written by roguesunday_

" i've never known who i am. i've never known my purpose, and that's what terrifies me the most - more than any amount of artillery fire ever could. because who wants to stare death in the face and not be able to tell them who they are? "

* * *

**_a preface and a disclaimer!_ **

hello and welcome to _the state of grace_! i am so, _so_ excited to share this. this story is inspired by all heroes that served in world war two, but more specifically the men of easy company. _band of brothers_ , miniseries and book alike, are powerful depictions of what everyday men endured when serving their country. i'm going to assume that anyone reading a band of brothers fanfiction is already aware of this, but if not, please check them out for yourself!

however, a disclaimer must be put in place. this story is based upon the actor portrayals in the hbo miniseries. in no way is this meant to disrespect the men that served in easy company, nor am i claiming that these depictions are true to the real men's character. this story is of the _alternate history-based genre_ , a term coined by many writing for the band of brothers/hbo war fandom. i am most definitely aware of the limitations women faced in the 1940s, and i am not at all trying to be disrespectful of their struggles. _the state of grace_ is just that: an alternative history.

throughout this story, i'm going to touch on topics that may be sensitive to certain readers, including but not limited to:

\- the holocaust

\- (graphic) depictions of violence and gore

\- period-typical sexism and misogyny

\- death

if any of these themes/topics are triggering to you, _please_ read with caution. if at any time you feel i should have a trigger warning before a chapter, dm me and i will be more than willing to put one in place. thank you for reading, and i'm excited for you to see what's to come <3


	2. epigraph

" love takes off the masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within. i use the word love here not merely in the personal sense, but as a state of being or a state of grace - not in the infantile American sense of being made happy, but in the tough and universal sense of quest and daring and growth. "

**_\- james a. baldwin_ **


	3. prologue

**SUMMER | 1942**

_Houma, Louisiana_

It had been nearly half an hour of silence before Victor broke it first.

“You’re gonna get eaten alive in there, Marley.”

And there it was. She might have laughed if she weren’t so tired. There was no single trace of humor, exaggeration, or nuance in his tone that could suggest he wasn’t being serious - that he didn’t actually believe his little sister was going to be put through the wringer by the men she was supposed to serve her country with. Yet there he sat, eyes tired and the weight of boy soldiers’ lives bearing down upon his shoulders. His grave expression made her curl into herself, bringing her knees up to her chest like the times she thought a boogeyman was hiding in the shadows of her closet. And who was to say what December 7th, 1941 brought to every American’s doorstep wasn’t some nightmare that kept kids awake in their beds?

She couldn’t bring herself to look back to her older brother’s worn, grim face. “I’m fighting the same cause as all of them, Vic. Have a little faith in me, okay?”

“It’s not you I don’t have faith in, it’s them. You don’t know them–”

“And you do?”

His answering glare shut down any defense she might muster. “I know more’n you do about military men. Don’t play dumb–”

She grimaced at that. Is that what he thought she was? Dumb for wanting to go overseas to help a cause in a way she knew how? To say that not only her older brothers had been in battle, but she had, too? Unwelcome embarrassment welled in her chest.

“–I was in their shoes three years ago and I’m the one who’s teaching the likes of ‘em now,” Vic said. “You don’t know what you’re getting yourself into here.”

Cecil had told her that, too, when she’d first confided in him about her considering to enlist. That had been back in January, a month since Pearl Harbor. Houma, Louisiana had since been shrouded in a fragile canopy of patriotism with creeping trepidation slowly poisoning the town’s roots. Man after man and boy after boy had trickled from their homes to wait in enlistment lines for hours at a time, sealing their fates and giving their lives away for other men to juggle. A roulette of who was to come back home to kiss their mothers was what Cecil had called it.

But she’d done it, anyway. She had been waiting for the butcher to bring out the family’s Sunday roast when the universe had throw its ace down; old Marrianne Richardson’s loud voice had sounded from across the shop as she mentioned to another townswoman of a letter from her sister-in-law in Georgia, and how rumours of a Paratrooper training camp, a brand new concept to the United States Military, was to be brought to the small, unhurried town of Toccoa.

Fifteen minutes later and she had heard all she needed to know: brand new concept, C-47s, parachuting out of said C-47s, and an extra fifty dollar salary. And then her fate was as sealed as the rest of the boys’ in Houma, but she’d be damned if she would allow another man to juggle her own life for her. That’s what she’d told herself, at least, when a newfound confidence had awoken something inside of her. It was a something that didn’t want to be stuck in languid Houma, Louisiana with a war raging right across the pond, or as her older brothers went off to fight in battles that they hadn’t started but desperately wanted to finish. She _needed_ to do it.

But now, with her eldest brother staring her down from across the table, she didn’t feel sure anymore.

“Cecil doubted me, too, but he came around to it. I don’t understand why you can’t, either,” she mumbled, looking down into her lap and twisting the skin of her palms.

“I dunno, how about because Cecil has _never_ been one to shy away from taking your side? You could light a building on fire and he’d find a way to believe you had good reason for doing it–”

She felt her face warm, though with anger or with the discomfort that he wasn’t entirely wrong, she wasn’t sure. “Shut _up_ –”

“You’re not some Average Joe that’s enlisting. You found a way to convince the United States _Military_ to allow a _girl_ into their ranks as a combat medic. You really don’t think that’s not gonna turn some heads? Or that all they’re gonna see is some ‘lil daughter of a doctor who worked her way into the Army? How am I the only one in this goddamn family that’s asking you to be realistic?”

Tears of frustration pooled in her eyes, but she still couldn’t look at her brother’s face. Because she knew, at the bottom of her heart, that he was right. She would turn heads, she would make people angry, and she’d be doubted and second guessed as soon as she stepped foot into Toccoa.

“You don’t think I know that, Vic? I _know_ I’m not gonna be liked, but…” She couldn’t finish, because there was absolutely nothing to say. Wasn’t wanting to serve enough?

“No. I _don’t_ think you know that. And so I have to ask you, because you’re a day away from being shipped off for however fuckin’ long this war is going to last, and it’s still not clear to me why my little sister is wanting to join the Army,” he said, voice stern and just as parental as she’d ever known it to be.

Finally, she willed herself to meet his eye.

“ _Why_ are you doing this, Marley?”

The immediate answer she’d wanted to say didn’t feel right sitting on the tip of her tongue. An unknown kind of fear, one sprouted from wavering convictions and a lack of self-assurance, turned her stomach sour and left her words stuck in her throat.

_Because she didn’t have an answer for him._


End file.
